Continual exposure, during the two decades of an adult child’s upbringing, to fear, trauma, abuse, and survival-oriented reactions created by parental dysfunction, alcoholism, and abuse prime him for significant, sometimes chronic tension, even later in life when triggers spark earlier, unresolved incidents or he is confronted with circumstances those from safe, secure, and stable homes may not perceive e as so daunting. What, then, is tension?
A psychological manifestation and sensation, it can be perceived as an internal tightness, resulting in elevated heart and blood pressure levels and the release of stress hormones. Like a giant, interior rubber band, it deludes the person into believing that it stretches to its maximum length, leaving him to believe that if something is not done to release its tenacity, it will imminently snap. At other times, it feels as if his brain were in an ever tightening vice. An adult child assuredly experienced these “on the edge” sensations during a major portion of his childhood, as the mere entry into the room of his controlling parent caused him to retreat within himself, cease all pleasurable focuses, and prepare for the next blame, shame, or harm. Tension can be the uncomfortable internal state that alerts: Something is about to happen! Get ready for it!
Later-in-life tension, despite the absence of the rigid parent and even a departure from the person’s home environment, can be self-created for four principle reasons.
1). A perceived obstacle to the attainment or successful completion of a goal or endeavor, which can be considered significant and important.
2). A conscious or subconscious perception that a person, place, or thing poses a potential threat and approximates the detrimental circumstances of his upbringing, such as an authority figure, who represents the displaced image of his parent.
3). The resultant consequences if the physical, mental, and/or emotional obstacle is not surmounted so that the goal can be reached, whether that goal be sheer safety or an actual accomplishment of some type.
4). The inability to triumph over the restriction.
I once asked someone which would create more tension about passing a college course and attaining his degree-the ability to write his name on a piece of paper or the requirement to research and write a 20-page term pager, use at least five sources, and do so in under an hour? The latter, obviously, carries three of the tension-creating elements: the need to complete a significant goal (write the term paper), the consequences of that inability (failure of the course), and the impossibility of doing so in a sixty-minute interval.
I doubt that writing a person’s name on a piece of paper to pass a university-level class would produce very much tension for anyone.
Already a cultivated victim, having had parental abuse or even insanity demonstrated as indicative of human behavior, and diminished in resources and development, an adult child may create an even deeper tension when confronted with certain aspects of life that carry these elements, discovering that the more he thinks his way into his helpless ability to overcome his obstacles, the more inhibited he becomes in overcoming them. He eventually forces himself into a mentally imposed prison and throws away the key.
Examination of my own tensions indicates that my subconscious is usually superimposing a present-time situation on an unresolved past-time incident, regenerating the inner child retreat, who was assuredly powerless, helpless, and tool-less, along with the fears, danger, traumas, incapacitations, and immobilizations experienced during its time of necessary creation.
Surmounting obstacles as an adult with these inabilities as a child, needless to say, creates tremendous tension, as the former states, “I have to prevail over this,” but the latter replies, “I can’t. I don’t know how!”
The more he tries, the greater becomes tension’s grip, until he is jammed by it.
Tension’s solutions, which can perhaps more accurately be labeled “tension’s relievers,” are many, but all depend upon the amount of recovery and the ability to pause and assess which of the three brain areas the person is operating from: the brain stem (amygdala-induced reactions), mid (emotions), or upper (logic, reasoning, and executive functioning). That “stop and think” strategy could be the threshold to varying degrees of release and relief, and can threshold several successful strategies.
The adult child, first and foremost, must realize that his past, tension-building reactions most likely never worked before and therefore will not work now. Instead, they will only tighten their grip on him.
Indeed, the solution is paradoxically not tightening his hold on its resign, but instead releasing it and surrendering it to a Higher Power, as he realizes that he is too limited and restricted to find all solutions within him. Because he was forced to do exactly that during his upbringing in the midst of deficient, abandoning parents, it may require significant recovery and “turning over” attempts before he is successful with the effort.
“‘Let go and let God ‘teaches us to release problems that trouble and confuse us because we are not able to solve them by ourselves,” according to Al-Anon’s “Courage to Change” text (Al-Anon Family Group Headquarters, Inc., 1992, p. 321).
The adult child must realize that his unresolved childhood issues and the helplessness they now generate are only blocking him and thus causing his tension build-up, not reduction.
Tantamount to understanding his tension-producing stressors is the determination of their intensity and severity. If they are particularly amplified and out-of-proportion for the emotions they create, then he can suspect that his past is playing out in his present without his awareness. Consideration of when he had similar feelings, particularly during his upbringing, may time-peg the incident and re-shelve it, considerably relieving his tension.
When I have used this method, my abusive father’s image has appeared and with that realization the tension has subsided, because I found myself chewing on an earlier-life episode that was feeding the fires of the later-in-life one.
There are several other tension relieving methods, whose effectiveness, based upon personal experience, has varied according to occasion and intensity.
When my internal circuit breaker seems like it is about to pop, the energy that causes it can be diffused or dissipated by speaking either with a sponsor or a trusted friend.
“Many of us have discovered that the telephone can be a life line between meetings,” according to “Courage to Change” (ibid, p. 116). “… A particularly useful time for Al-Anon phone calls is when we are preparing to do something new or frightening. Many of us ‘book-end’ these actions. We make an Al-Anon call before taking the action and we follow (it) with a second call. For those of us who have always acted alone, there is a way to share our risks and our courage with others who will love and support us, no matter what happens.”
Another relieving method is pressing the personal “pause” button by interrupting the building intensity with other, more pleasurable activities or focuses. Like a loop, tensions continually run the same circular track in the brain and heavy emotions ensure that they remain impressed into it, unable to locate the happier “off ramp.”
“Sometimes a horse refuses to obey a rider’s command and races out of control,” advises “Courage to Change” (ibid, p. 306). “My thoughts can do this too, when I frantically try, over and over, to solve a difficult problem… When my thoughts race out of control, I need to stop. I need to do this by breathing deeply and looking at my surroundings. It can help to replace the obsessive thoughts with something positive… “
Awareness of the mind’s thoughts and refocusing on external stimuli is known as “mindfulness.”
Light music, a comedy television show, taking a drive, and communing with nature, particularly on a warm, spring day, have all aided me in releasing my mind’s grip from tension’s track.
“When I’m trying to tackle a tough problem or cope with a stressful situation, and I’ve done all I can for the moment, what then?” asks “Courage to Change” (ibid, p. 290). “I can do something that will nurture my mind, body, or spirit. Perhaps I’ll take a walk or listen to music.”
During such walks, I myself have gazed up toward and temporarily immersed myself in the sky’s infinity, realizing how small I and my tension-provoking problems really are in relation to it all.
At times I also think of the friends and relatives who had once been a part of my life, but who are no longer in life, and wonder how important my concerns are in relation to their eternal existences now. How many, I can only ask myself, care that 20 or so years ago, when they were alive, that they had had a “bad hair day?” How, then, can I continue to view my own worries and trepidations with any degree of lasting severity?
As these efforts enable me to adopt new perspectives, my tensions-and the circumstances that cause them-begin to dissolve. I stand on the physical platform designated earth and negotiate the life I have been given in my imperfect and impermanent state the best way I can until someday, like those who preceded me, my cares and concerns will collapse into meaninglessness.
Sources:
“Courage to Change.” Virginia Beach, Virginia: Al-Anon Family Group Headquarters, Inc., 1992.